Nothing is ever as simple as it can seem.
Take the current ICE project: i assume its function is meant to be the kicking out of illegal immigrants. If that’s what it does, then nobody can honestly complain about the objective there: all countries reserve the right of admittance.
However, there are ways of doing this that do not depend on brute force and the use of deadly weapons unless the officers find themselves under armed attack. Brute force serves to alienate even some of the people who would otherwise support the action of tightening national borders.
Britain is, and has for quite some time, been targeted by people crossing the Channel from France and other parts of Europe hoping to settle in the UK and find there whatever they imagine they might find. As a result, and this I know from the experience of family members working in schools, classes contain groups of so-called students who are incapable of being taught, simply because they have no grasp of English. As a result, overcrowding and tensions arise, to the detriment of the kids who are indigenous to the country. There used to be classes where these foreigners received special help, but in the instances to which I refer, such help vanished long ago because there are not the funds to continue.
My mother lived here in Spain for a while. She eventually had to go back to Scotland and was horrified to discover that some services she had taken for granted would be open to her, simply by virtue of nationality, were not: she had to wait six months before becoming eligible again. Some immigrants find themselves in receipt of better treatment than that!
Brexit was touted to be the answer, that Britain would once again own its borders and be able to keep out those not welcome. Of course, that was bullshit: the illegals just kept right on coming. Those skilled foreign people who keep the UK National Health Service on its feet - just - found themselves in a difficult spot: legally in Britain, they didn’t know if they would be allowed to stay, be able to afford to stay, or discover too much local dislike to stomach day after day. The “illegals” problem is already creating a lot of damage in southern Europe, and I can promise you that many folks here would be a lot happier if their social services money was spent on them, not on people with whom there is no connection.
As I suggest, it’s really too easy to confuse the theory behind the existence of the heavies with the behaviour of some of the heavies themselves. However, no country can afford to lie back and just give up. Neither should it have to do so.
